Church Friendship Evaluation

The Church Friendship program has included 11 Nicaraguan churches and 3 North American (US and Canada) churches from 2016-2020 although it began with 2 groups in 2010. The churches are from a variety of denominations, and the program seeks that variety to help churches foster unity across doctrinal differences. The evaluation covered 2016-2019 because of the documentation available during that time period and its congruence with the program becoming an official Nehemiah Center program. The program has focused on carrying out activities in 5 different areas: 

• prayer
• communication
• mutual learning
• fellowship
• teamwork

These are the pillars of the "house" of the program, based on a foundation of holistic mission, or the idea that the Gospel affects all areas of life. The pillars allow the participants to move towards cultural transformation, referring to changes in their private, institutional and national ways of doing things through encounters with the "other."

The evaluation from May to August was lead by Marissa Azmitia, a professional researcher and evaluator in Nicaragua. Assisting her were Adrianna and Raúl Herrera, facilitators of the Church Friendship program at the Nehemiah Center. The evaluation compared plans, reports, notes, and testimonies of the facilitators and participants over the years, and from that bibliographic information, Marissa developed surveys for the leadership and congregations of the participating churches, which were translated into English for the North American participants. 54 leaders and pastors and 172 church members responded to the surveys. 

It was found that the program has answered crucial needs of pastors, their families, and church leaders in Nicaragua and North America. "Without a doubt, these are actions that please God and are consistent withe the call of the NC in Nicaragua," states the evaluation report. The program is relevant because it meets the needs of the participants and fosters relationships among churches. The congregations know about these relationships, with 67% of the Nicaraguans and 87% of the North Americans that know about the program and can name their friendship churches. The program has fostered horizontal, collaborative relationships among the pastors in Nicaragua and with their North American counterparts. It is believed that there is broad awareness of the program through announcements in churches, visits in churches from representatives of friendship churches or facilitators from the Nehemiah Center, and times of prayer for friendship churches. 

The surveys sought to evaluate the effectiveness of the five program pillars and created an average response between 1 and 5 to understand the true median response of the participants. You can see those results for each pillar in the infographic below. 

Although it is difficult to fully measure the impact or changes that the program caused because there weren't initial surveys or a baseline to measure the differences over time, the pastors and leaders described many changes in their lives, the church, and their relationships with other churches - even including unplanned results such as a pastor's son becoming an exchange student in the US where they had a friendship church, or the pastors expressing newfound friendships and trust with their fellow pastors. 

Of course, there were recommendations for improvement for the Nehemiah Center in the future. The evaluation team recommends that the Nehemiah Center develop a communication strategy with the participating churches to increase the congregations' awareness of the program and the differences between these relationships and other church relationships within their denominations. They also recommend that the Nehemiah Center establish a dialogue and explain the transition stage to independence to the pastors and church leaders. Subsequent dialogues with the pastors showed that the Nehemiah Center needs to help facilitate the process of independence by providing the churches with a guide of increased responsibility and expectations. It is recommended that the Nehemiah Center improve the structure and writing of the program results and indicators to measure change instead of activities, and to establish a baseline for those results before beginning the reporting cycle. 

Overall, we are pleased with the evaluation and all the things we learned in the process. We are thankful to God for his provision and guidance of the program despite its shortcomings on an institutional level. How great that this program has been relevant and effective for the pastors, leaders and church members, and that it has contributed to a greater understanding of the Body of Christ in all the world! 

What is Productive?

Productive, according to Merriam-Webster's online dictionary, can be defined as "having the quality or power of producing especially in abundance." 

Producing in abundance. 

But producing what, exactly? 

At the beginning of February, a group came to the Nehemiah Center from Innerkip, Ontario. It was the first split-purpose group that I had coordinated. Part of the group was going to help replace the Nehemiah Center's roof, and the other group was going to do more "relational" activities like learn about the Christian education organization the church supports, organize children's activities and visit homes to pray for and evangelize to people. However, they didn't have set teams. Each evening, there was an open invitation for the "relational activities" for the next day, and those who wanted to stay and work on the roof project could. I had told the Nicaraguan roofer that I thought he would have 5-7 people working each day. The team started out with most of the men (7 total) wanting to work on the roof, but as the week went on, more and more started going to the church activities. The last work day, only 3 people stuck around the Nehemiah Center for the entire day.

One of the more "work-oriented" team members said that he figured he could always work on roofs or construction since that was his job in Canada, but he couldn't always visit people in their homes to pray for them. He chose what he thought would be a more transformative experience. 

This surprised me because I had mentally prepared myself for the work component of this team since I usually coordinate strictly relational (friendship) trips. In the past, I had a pretty negative view of these teams, but I have come to appreciate them more during my years in Nicaragua. Instead of simply focusing on work and how much could be accomplished, these team members were also looking to create relationships with the Nicaraguan roofers and get involved with the church activities. They even invited the Nicaraguan roofing team to a birthday party for one of the team members one night, and they all had a great time.

Since I work in a more relationally-oriented program, I often hear church leaders say that one of the biggest push-backs they hear about the Church Friendship Program is that people don't understand the concept of the trips. "What will we do?" they question. People want to produce something, see the effects of what they do with their hands, appreciate what they have done with their own eyes.

It's harder to do that when you're building relationships. A person's smile might grow wider, or their trust might be deeper, but those are things that are hard to measure. Nonetheless, this team chose to emphasize the abundance of relationships, and they measured the productivity of their time in the goals they met, like praying out loud in a group or checking in with people they had met in past years. For them, these relationships that were created certainly lead to a productive trip!

In this season of COVID19 with social distancing and isolation, the parameters of "productive" have shifted for most people. Perhaps we can't meet with pastors or clients like we used to. Perhaps instead of going to the office every day after a specific morning routine we mix things up more. Perhaps our training or teaching needs to be online without as much feedback as we are used to. Perhaps we feel like we aren't making any progress in our tasks.

Perhaps we need to change our expectations of being productive.

Now is also a time when people need relationships more than ever. Perhaps it's time to focus on a different type of productivity. How can we reach out to make our relationships with God, each other, and ourselves richer, deeper, and more life-giving? What can you do to produce relationships in abundance today?

Significant Impact

This year at the Nehemiah Center (NC) we are trying to up our game on evaluation and monitoring, so we started asking teams to fill out evaluations. Yes, this used to be done, but somewhere in the busyness and upheaval of life, no one reminded me that written evaluations were a thing so they fell by the wayside. However, we started written evaluations for teams again this year. Besides being encouraging as far as how we were doing our work, there were some cool questions included. One of the thought questions was "what significantly impacted you during this trip?"

Here are some answers that have stuck out to me, taken anonymously from four different groups.

What significantly impacted you during this trip?

• The meetings with Nehemiah Center (NC) partners, ministries, ministry workers and community connections. 
• In order to pray we need to dream, like Paul praying his dreams in Ephesians 1:15-20
• Great times of prayer
• Encouraging signs of God's work in Nicaragua, even through pain and suffering
• The church service was powerful, especially as the congregation prayed for us
• all the various talks, seeing and hearing about the effects of the 2018 crisis
• Great opportunity to learn about Nicaraguan culture and how the NC is helping motivate churches to be the hands and feet of Jesus Christ. This has become even more important following the social unrest that occurred in 2018.
• Feeling God's Spirit this week
• The staff at the NC and their walk with Christ 
• Seeing Nicaragua's beauty and remembering its Creator
• The way the team prayed for the NC staff
• The love and passion for Jesus and God in all the people, but mostly the power of prayer
• Seeing our friends again and how they missed us
• Seeing the youth in some of the churches start to take on leadership roles
• The closeness of everyone; we genuinely cared about each other and prayed sincerely
• Watching friendship continue to develop and grow; memories from previous trips were shared and relationships were deepened
• The Holy Spirit moving in the people on the team and staff, being focused on prayer and seeking God's direction for all decisions was the most impactful
• Praying in our own language together [at the same time] aloud
• Hearing the pastors preach at their churches and the community event service
• learning about the poverty attitude. I didn't see it last time, and so when all the kids had to get in a line [but wouldn't because they kept pushing to the front], it was just shocking to me how it affects everything for them, all the way to their mentalities
• Painting the prayer room

Wow! It's so cool to read these testimonies. I get to be part of this work in people's lives, and I am grateful to God for what He is showing people who come to Nicaragua and what He does in all of our lives. To Him be the glory!

Discovering Talent

Listening to presentations about the Nehemiah Center programs

The first group that visited Nicaragua came from southern Ontario, Canada from January 15-24 to learn more about the Nehemiah Center and work on the roof replacement project. This church had raised the larger part of the funds necessary to replace the thatch roof over the rancho area as well as the tile roof in the office complex. They felt especially satisfied to be able to unload the new materials themselves.

Unloading new roofing materials

There was one team member who couldn't participate in physical labor or painting, but she wanted to minister to the people at the office and help in any way that she could. We suggested she could teach the ladies how to bake things, pray with staff and practice English with the young people. Not all of our plans worked out the way we envisioned, partly because of lack of communication and partly because of lack of structure; however, Gertie was a blessing to the people at the Nehemiah Center. Some ladies learned how to make new recipes for cookies or cakes. The kitchen staff learned a new casserole recipe. Program coordinators were prayed for and remembered. And the kids? They liked having something to do when they were hanging out after school with Gertie, practicing English, baking, or doing crafts.

Saraí is in the green shirt, interpreting for a puppet show

One of biggest things that impacted me from Gertie's time with the Nehemiah Center was finding out that one of the teenage daughters of a couple working at the Nehemiah Center was really good at English! When Saraí was around, Gertie sent the translator away. This young woman, whom I have watched grow up but never really interacted with, has proven to be a leader, translator, and good with kids and languages. She not only helped Gertie a lot with the other kids, but when we needed someone for a day a month later for a community event with another group, Saraí jumped into translating puppet shows on the fly, organizing kids for crafts and helping out in all sorts of ways. It was incredible to witness the gifts God has given her and find this resource so close to us at the Nehemiah Center!

Saraí directing the kids in a game of parachute

Delegation

I am reading through Exodus during my morning devotions, and this passage stood out to me this week:

17 Moses’ father-in-law replied, “What you are doing is not good. 18 You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out. The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone. 19 Listen now to me and I will give you some advice, and may God be with you. You must be the people’s representative before God and bring their disputes to him. 20 Teach them his decrees and instructions, and show them the way they are to live and how they are to behave. 21 But select capable men from all the people—men who fear God, trustworthy men who hate dishonest gain—and appoint them as officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens. 22 Have them serve as judges for the people at all times, but have them bring every difficult case to you; the simple cases they can decide themselves. That will make your load lighter, because they will share it with you. 23 If you do this and God so commands, you will be able to stand the strain, and all these people will go home satisfied.” (Exodus 18)

Jethro was a wise man. When a person tries to do too much on their own, especially in leadership positions, they and the people around them suffer. I have seen this very clearly in my own life when I feel overwhelmed.

This winter, I have been learning to delegate. Raúl has been working with me for two years now, and slowly but surely I am learning how to let go of some things and let him do them. Starting in January 2020, Teresa joined the Church Friendship team as well, and I am learning a whole new level of delegation.

Teresa was a Cohort of Missioner participant in Costa Rica from 2018-2019. She is from Chinandega, Nicaragua and found out about the Cohort program by being a leader for IMPACT clubs. Another Cohort graduate, Nereyda, is coordinating IMPACT clubs and recommended the Cohort experience to Teresa. She left Nicaragua to serve in Costa Rica for a year. When she came back to Nicaragua in July 2019, Resonate started the process of trying to get a US visa for Teresa to be part of a pilot Cohort program in Detroit. (For those of you who don't know, I started in Nicaragua as a volunteer in the Cohort of Missioners program, called Caminantes in Spanish. You can learn more about the Cohort watching This Video.) Resonate asked the Nehemiah Center to help vouch for Teresa and see if there could be a job for her when she came back to Nicaragua after being in Michigan, so I started getting to know her. We invited her to some prayer meetings in Chinandega and the Nehemiah Center's 20th anniversary celebration. Unfortunately, Teresa's visa was denied so she didn't go to the United States in January as planned. After observing her at these events, we asked if she would like to volunteer with the Nehemiah Center in the Church Friendship program, and she agreed. She started with us at the beginning of January 2020.

Teresa is a very personable, joyful person who is interested in learning. She seems to be able to strike up a conversation and start laughing within the first five minutes with most people she talks to. She speaks English and was teaching beginner English classes to kids in Costa Rica as a Caminante. As we worked with her, Raúl and I observed that Teresa is very teachable. When we gave her feedback, she tried to put it into practice right away. Teresa was always willing to run errands, help translate, call to confirm reservations and even lead the teams on their tourist days so Raúl and I could have a break. She started learning both the financial part of teams (which Raúl usually takes care of) and the coordinating and translating (which I mostly do). 

It has been a challenge for me to take the time to explain (and explain again) what needs to be done and how to do it. I feel like it takes longer than if I were to do it myself. However, I know that this is part of the process and good for character formation in Teresa as well as myself. She has been a huge help. Together with her and Raúl, we led four teams in 8 weeks and participated in other Nehemiah Center activities, and I didn't shout at administrative staff or break down crying during that whole time.



Jethro was right. Trying to do it all wears a person out. Even though delegating takes more work initially, it helps alleviate the strain and all the people go home satisfied. I'm thankful for Teresa helping bear the load over these past few months! We will see what the next months bring. Pray for Teresa and the Nehemiah Center as they explore options for the future.

Love in the time of COVID-19

While the rest of the world has been taking measures like closing borders to travelers and self-isolating, Nicaragua has been carrying on with business as usual for the last several weeks. People have been talking about the virus, but few were changing their lives. When the US made announcements about policies, many mission organizations, including Resonate Global Mission, Raúl and my sending organization, gave missionaries in Nicaragua recommendations for different actions, but it was hard to swim against the current.

Since Raúl and I flew to El Salvador via Panama for our consultation there March 7-10, we decided to take some measures like avoiding social gatherings and working from home as much as possible. However, we weren't sure how far to take those measures because life around us was normal. We spent some time at home and stocked up on groceries.

The weekend we were laying low, the Nicaraguan government announced public marches to show love and solidarity to the rest of the world. Raúl and I had a meeting at the beach hotel we were going to have the CRCNA regional retreat, but we went there to cancel the meeting. It was a lovely, quiet day at the beach - perfect for us. On our way back to Managua, we saw one of the "love in the time of COVID-19" marches. An interesting national response, but well-intentioned.

Nicaragua announced its first confirmed case of coronavirus last night.

Now we have lots of company in taking preventative measures. The Nehemiah Center is urging staff to follow medical recommendations, wash hands frequently, clean surfaces, avoid being in closed-in areas or meeting with more than 15 people, maintain at least a meter of distance between people, and prepare for sickness or shortages. They are also asking people to avoid using public transportation.

In some ways, I feel like we have been through something similar in Nicaragua because during the crisis, we stocked up on food, stayed home, didn't assemble in large groups and avoided public transportation. Maybe our experiences over the last two years help us be better prepared for the world crisis we are facing now.

Thankfully, God stays the same. Whether it's the bubonic plague or COVID-19, God remains in control. We can trust HIM. Bible verses can comfort us, but the true peace comes from knowing that in life or in death, we belong to Jesus.

Work Yourselves Out of a Job

In overseas development training, they tell us to work alongside other people, preferably from the country where we are serving, so that we are not the only ones who know how to do what we do. The goal is to eventually work ourselves out of a job, they say.

I don't always know how I feel about this principle (how do you build trust in relationships if you tell people you're trying not to work with them very long?), but the time has come to put it into practice with the Church Friendship Program at the Nehemiah Center.

One aspect of this is helping established friendship groups define and carry out their activities. Instead of Adrianna and Raúl calling and reminding and organizing, it's time for the local pastors and leaders (in Nicaragua and North America) to decide what needs doing and make sure it gets done.

On Wednesday, November 27 in Chinandega we met to define essential activities for the friendship, and each of the pastors will coordinate an area. The goal is for this friendship group to be carrying out its own activities without Raúl and Adrianna pushing things by June 2020.

So what is essential for friendship to continue, according to these pastors? We are still waiting for corroboration from their sister church in Pella, Iowa, but here's the list as it stands:

1) Prayer is fundamental. This means meeting the last Friday of every month to pray together and send prayer requests to the sister churches.

2) Combined services. Joining together in worship twice a year shows unity among the churches.

3) Pastoral family retreats. These have been a precious time of rest, rejuvenation and quality time together for each individual family and the group as a whole. If the team from Iowa could join them during the July retreat, that would be a bonus.

4) Continuing Education. Have a seminar or conference for a day in some area of ministry for pastors and leaders to update them in their practices. They would really like the speaker from the Nehemiah Center's anniversary celebration, Israel Ortiz from Guatemala, to come.

5) Visits from sister church. Receiving delegations from the Pella church once a year will help cultivate the relationship and involve the churches more.

Our meeting with the Chinandega pastors on Wednesday

Each pastor is responsible for making sure that an activity is carried out. Raúl and Adrianna will be coaching them in these next months so they have all the tools they need for the transition. Pray for us in this new process, and for the pastors to be able to continue serving God and each other in unity!